Lesson 2.8 · Nouns

Number

Singular and plural, marked by one letter slipped into the ending.

To make any noun plural, slip an i in before the job letter. Nothing else changes:

logword omasculine imore than one sthey are doing it

So the whole plural set is the singular set with an i slotted in:

Job	One	More than one
doing it	`logos`	`logois`
done to	`logon`	`logoin`
of	`logou`	`logoiu`
to / for	`logo`	`logoi`
spoken to	`logor`	`logoir`

And the same for any other word: agapas → agapais, anthrōpon → anthrōpoin, bibliem → biblieim.

In real verses

en toi ouranoi
in the heavens (Matthew 6:9) — ouran·o·i, plural, "to/for/in" form.

huper teiu probateiu
for the sheep (John 10:11) — probat·e·i·u, neuter, plural, "of".

In the Greek — no separate plural set

Greek does not have a plural marker. It has an entirely separate set of endings for the plural, different again in each declension: λόγος/λόγοι, λόγον/λόγους, ἀγάπη/ἀγάπαι, πόλις/πόλεις. Learning them roughly doubles the number of endings to memorise. Here one letter does it, and the job letter after it stays exactly the same.

Practice

What is anthrōpois?
What is anthrōpoin?
What is tou anthrōpou, and how many people is that?

Show the answers

"People", doing something — anthrōp·o·i·s.
"People", on the receiving end — the same word with n instead of s.
"Of the person" — one person, because there is no i before the u.

← 2.7The vocative Next → 2.9Neuter nouns

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